Unknown Consequences
by MineralRabbit
Summary: Your actions and decisions usually effect more people than you realise. Sometimes in a good way, sometimes bad. Mystery Dungeon ficlet. Not really.


His heart ached as the sight of all of his new friends as they became further and further from reach. He could see the tears in his new best friend's eyes. He had known for a while now that he couldn't remain a pokemon forever, that it was a temporary thing, that he would become human and have his memories returned to him as soon as he had saved the world.

But he didn't want to leave. He loved all of his pokemon friends and felt as if he really belonged there with everyone and as part of a rescue team. He was doing good here, he was a hero. He wanted to stay…

No sooner than he'd thought it, it was done. He found himself once again at the top of the mountain where Xatu stared at the sun, once again he was a pikachu and once again he was surrounded by friends. He silently thanked Gardevoir, as everyone embraced him in a crushing hug, for letting him stay forever.

~*~

Maggie Kensington, aged thirty eight years, felt like she had aged ten more in the last twenty three days. Maggie Kensington was a homemaker, a mother and a loving wife to one John Kensington who owned a library in town. Maggie enjoyed baking pies for her husband, chit-chatting with her neighbours about other neighbours in the sweet suburban street and reading romance novels with her loving husband.

However, twenty three days ago, when her son did not return home from school and none of her neighbours had seen him, Maggie Kensington had begun to panic. As with most suburban housewives, when she called the police she received the distinct impression that the officer on the other end of the phone line thought that she was over reacting. Tragically, it is so often true that she was for now ignored.

It was three days later, after Maggie Kensington had bitten off all of her fingernails in an unladylike manner, that she called back and she was finally taken seriously. She was told to keep calm repeatedly and, as her husband left for work each morning, saying _it'll be okay_, she immediately took to baking pies. It was a pleasant distraction for now and it wouldn't be long until her son was found.

She tried not to think of the word _if_ as she reminded herself of this. She tried not to add the words _in pieces_ or _dead_, too. Alas, pie baking could only keep her from thinking these dark thoughts for so long and each evening when her husband returned home from work he would find her in the kitchen with a bottle of wine, staring at the wall.

This continued for almost three weeks and, with each day, Maggie Kensington lost a little more hope until the twenty third day, when she could not make herself bake another pie and simply broke down at the kitchen table, crying.

~*~

Gardevoir had just arrived at the sweet suburban home where she had first found the human she had needed to save the world and within seconds was almost overwhelmed by the raw grief and sadness she felt, coming from the boy's home. She couldn't make herself refuse him when he practically begged to stay, so pure was his need to stay with his friends, but now she regretted it. This woman she saw through the kitchen window was his mother. She has taken this woman's child. In a rare moment, Gardevoir was consumed by her own turbulent emotions rather than someone else's and felt the need to somehow comfort this woman, in order to make amends, even though the woman did not know Gardevoir's part in her son's disappearance and would probably never believe it if she was told.

With a rush of determination, Gardevoir cast an illusion over herself and stood at the back door.

Maggie Kensington raised her tear-stained face from her arms when she heard a scratching noise. She sniffled and stood slowly, composing herself a little as she went to the back door. Who on earth would be at the back door? Her hands still shook a little as she opened the door, but her woes were – for the briefest moment – forgotten in her surprise to find a pikachu at her door. Wild pokemon never came close to the houses around here, but this pikachu was standing there, as if waiting for something.

It was at this precise moment that Maggie Kensington noticed what the pokemon had on its head. She knelt and reached with trembling hands for the bandana and took it from the pikachu. She felt the tears resurface as she recognised the bandana as her son's – with the same pikachu image he had sown on himself and she had taught him how. She clutched the worn red fabric close to her chest as she broke down into sobs once more. After a minute or so, she looked back up at the pikachu which was still standing there, watching her. She stopped sobbing, staring back at the pokemon and said quietly "thank you." The pikachu nodded and abruptly turned tail and ran away.

Maggie Kensington stayed there, staring into the backyard where the pikachu had vanished so suddenly, for quite a while. She eventually stood and drifted into the small garden, the bandana still clutched tightly in her hand against her chest, and sat at the small garden table. The sun was beginning to set and, in a blaze of orange and yellow, she looked and felt the fabric over and over again, feeling and remembering every detail. As she watched the sun sink over the horizon, she felt more at ease than she had in weeks. She couldn't really explain it, but the hope that she had drunk and cried away seemed suddenly to fill her again as the sun's last rays painted her in warm oranges and reds. There was still hope in her yet and, as long as the sun would rise and fall every day, there always would be.

~End

Don't look at me like that. I haven't actually written anything in ages. Think of this as dusting off the cobwebs. Urgh, this plot bunny sank its teeth into my brain when I finished the first Mystery Dungeon game and its been gnawing away since then and I just had to write something.  
Take what you will from it.

By the by, I don't own anyone except Maggie and John Kensington.. And their son I suppose.

Ciao xox


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